Worried about using Zoom? Here are video tips and alternatives – AZCentral

Ken Colburn, Special for The Republic Published 6:00 a.m. MT April 6, 2020

Marilyn Rodriguez, top left, held an election day watch party via Zoom on March 17, 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic.(Photo: Submitted by Marilyn Rodriguez)

Question: Is it safe to use Zoom for my video conferences or should I consider something else?

Answer: With most of the country under a stay-at-home order, the use of video conferencing has skyrocketed.

Zooms user numbers reportedly went from around 10 million daily users in December to more than 200 million in March.

Whenever anything on the internet gets this popular, it attracts both security researchers and those with malicious intent.

Zoom has been dealing with a number of privacy and security problemsthat has led to the banning of the service by SpaceX and NASA for their employees: seekingalpha.com.

To their credit, Zoom has updated their software to block the various exploits discovered by researchers and are focusing on improving security and privacy for all users:blog.zoom.us.

One of the most common problems with the Zoom platform is from uninvited attendees that disrupt the video chat with a variety of antics, referred to asZoom-bombing.

Its photo-bombing on steroids as trolls post vulgar comments, pornographic images, and racist epithets to unsuspecting users, usually in a large gathering.

Its caused many online gatherings to shut down as new users dont understand how to securely host a meeting. The very thing thats made Zoom so popular its ease of use is also what made it very easy for those with little experience to be exploited.

Many hosts made the mistake of publishing their meeting link on social media or other public methods that made it easy for pranksters to crash the party.

If youre going to host a Zoom meeting, itsimportantthat you get up to speed on the settings that will reduce the chances of outside disruption.

Two basic steps you should start with are to use an Instant or Scheduled Meeting ID (support.zoom.us) instead of your Personal Meeting ID - and turning on the Waiting Room option.

Your Personal Meeting ID is like a permanent reserved room for you, so if someone outside of your group acquires it, they caninterrupt any meeting you host.

The Waiting Room (support.zoom.us) gives you control over when and if a participant joins a meeting.Everyone that is attempting to join is kept there until you admit them, one at a time or all at once.

Cornell University has published an excellent checklist to securing Zoom at:it.cornell.edu.

If you dont need a platform where everyone can be seen or dont need to host alarge number of people, there are lots of options that may be more suitable.

Apple expanded FaceTime to 32 users some years ago, but this means that all attendees must have an Apple device to join.

If your group has users with a variety of devices and operating systems, you can use Google Hangouts (hangouts.google.com) on any device as long as they each have a Google account.

If you dont really need video on the call, you can use tools like Uber Conference (uberconference.com) to hold meetings which uses moving avatars so youll know whos speaking at any given time.

If you want a more controlled broadcasting tool for connecting with a large group, check out StreamYard (streamyard.com), which can also simulcast to YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitch.

Ken Colburn is founder and CEO of Data Doctors Computer Services,datadoctors.com.Ask any tech question atfacebook.com/DataDoctorsor on Twitter@TheDataDoc.

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Worried about using Zoom? Here are video tips and alternatives - AZCentral

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